Someone at the Love Shack Reads Ichabod

JOB OPENING AT NPH


Northwestern Publishing House, Milwaukee, Wis., is currently seeking a Merchandise (spelling error fixed) Buyer. View the job description and apply online.

***

GJ - I suspect my resume would not be considered.

Mark Jeske Is the LCMS-WELS-ELS Board Member of Thrivent. All Three Sects Are Happy Working with ELCA, Sharing Funding with ELCA. Duggar Hypocrisy Award Winners

Robert Lara, pictured above, was a liturgical dancer at the Metro New York Synod meeting of ELCA.

The "conservative" Lutheran clergy and laity are commenting - no one would guess they happily work with ELCA at many levels, with Thrivent serving as the unifying agency, Mark Jeske as their overpaid representative on the Thrivent Board of Directors.

Jeske's Thrivent bio does not mention his synod
or his Church and Change leadership.
He has obtained Thrivent funding
for joint WELS-LCMS-ELCA clergy events.

Liturgical cross-dressing in WELS,
with children applying the make-up.
Mrs. Adam Mueller's Church and Change congregation in Tucson.

Athletic cross-dressing in WELS,
Michigan Lutheran Seminary.

College gay video plagiarism -
no problem for WELS.
They all received calls. 

Joel Hochmuth joined WELS SP Mark Schroeder in
denouncing ELCA for its gay activism -
just before Hochmuth went to the slammer for gay child porn swapping.
Herman Otten was quick to denounce me on page 1
for publishing the truth about WELS.

Thrivent Salesmen Get Divine Calls from the Conference of Presidents in WELS. Insurance License - Required. Seminary Training - Optional

Rick Kneser on LinkedIn

06/01/15             WISCONSIN EVANGELICAL LUTHERAN SYNOD              8:43 am

                     P A S T O R   C A L L   R E P O R T
                       05/26/2015  through  06/01/2015

 Kneser, Mr Rick            Conference of Preside - Waukesha WI  05/15/2015
         Christian Giving Counselor

Job Opening at Northworst Publishing House - Where the New NIV Is Mandatory. Good News for WELS School Alumni - Spelling Does NOT Count

JOB OPENING AT NPH

Northwestern Publishing House, Milwaukee, Wis., is currently seeking a Mechandise (sic) Buyer. View the job description and apply online.

Dr. Robert Barnes, Martyr and Confessor - Post by Douglas Lindee, Intrepid Lutherans

Order here.

Although almost forgotten today, Robert Barnes (1495-1540) played a significant role in bringing the Reformation to England. Influenced by Luther and his continental followers, Barnes was an unabashed advocate of the Lutheran ‘heresy’ in the England of Henry VIII. Barnes and his martyrdom are powerful expressions of the theology of the cross and the great comfort which God bestows on those whom He has brought to faith in their great Redeemer.  ISBN 978-1891469022 • 48 pages • paperback • $4.99

About Dr. Robert Barnes, Lutheran martyr:

From Douglas Lindee on Intrepid Lutherans - 

I won’t say much about his essay, Treatise on Justification, other than to point out the following:

1. Regarding the false doctrine of Universal Justification – a relatively recent innovation among Lutherans that is now widely confessed among the majority of America’s Lutheran church bodies, and a doctrine which has been very frequently discussed, both at length and in depth, on Intrepid Lutherans (most recently in the post, What do you do with a Certified Letter? Here is one idea... ) – one will not find any support whatsoever in Dr. Barnes’ Treatise for this false teaching . At no point does Barnes confess the doctrine of Universal Justification, nor does he imply it, nor is there a shred of evidence suggesting that such a doctrine is “implicit” in his Treatise. Rather, over and over and over again we read Barnes’ emphatic confession that BEFORE GOD we are JUSTIFIED ONLY BY FAITH!.
   
   It’s almost as if he had read the Augsburg Confession (AC:IV; AC VI; AC:XXIV:28ff) and its Apology(AP:II(IV):48ff; AP:II(IV):86ff; AP:III:61; AP:III:93ff ;AP:III:171ff; AP:III:177; AP:III:265; AP:V(XII):36) and actively discussed in depth with Luther and Melanchthon the doctrines they confessed! Both of those confessional documents were published during his tenure with Luther and Melanchthon in Wittenberg, and they make a confession that is identical to that of Dr. Barnes in his Treatise. That is the evidence I see in what follows, below.


2. Dr. Barnes, like Luther, does not regard faith as an idle or passive thing, but as something that is active.


3. Dr. Barnes, like Luther, sees two different kinds of “faith,” one that does not save and one that does. In one place, he uses this distinction in the manner of Augustana, as “that which merely acknowledges or believes the historical facts of Jesus Christ” and “that which believes we have grace, righteousness, and forgiveness of sins through Christ” (AC:XX:23), but in another place he adduces St. Athanasius to defend the idea that there is one kind of faith that is a gift of God which “justifies,” and that there is a second kind which is also a gift of God “whereby miracles are done.” Unable to find the source and context from the writings of St. Athanasius in English, I note this in footnote 16. I’m not sure if this is a doctrine that has been formally rejected, or a line of thinking that was never developed, but I note it here to alert the reader, because I have never heard this teaching before and thought it was rather curious.


4. Dr. Barnes directly addresses the accusation that “Faith is a work, and therefore cannot justify,” and rejects it. Faith does not justify because it is either “work” or “merit,” rather “faith alone justifies, because it is that thing alone whereby I do depend upon Christ.”


5. Regarding the formatting of the text, there was no bold or italics in the text of the 1842 document from which this was taken. I added these elements of formatting to signify the quotation of Scripture and of the Church Fathers, and to aid in the emphases and distinctions being made by Barnes.


6. Regarding the footnotes, all of the footnotes from the 1842 document are reproduced here (with more explanatory text in most cases), except for one: in many places, the term “justice” was footnoted as “righteousness” for clarification. In those places, I simply substituted the word “righteousness” and omitted the footnote. In addition, I have added several other footnotes directing the reader to sources of quotations from the Church Fathers used by Dr. Barnes, and added one explanatory footnote.


7. The main heading was in the original document, I added the subheadings to help break up the essay a bit, due to its length.


8. Finally, this has got to be the clearest, most direct, most complete and most efficient defense of Justification by Faith Alone that I have yet read. It utterly devastates the works righteousness of the Romans and of other Synergists and Pelagians, and leaves no doubt as to the clarity of Scripture on the issue: apart from faith, there is no Justification whatsoever.

“Faith, however, reconciles and justifies BEFORE GOD the moment we apprehend the promise by faith. And throughout our entire life we are to pray God and be diligent, to receive faith and to grow in faith. For, as stated before, faith is where repentance is, and it is not in those who walk after the flesh. This faith is to grow and increase throughout our life by all manner of afflictions. Those who obtain faith are regenerated, so that they lead a new life and do good works.” (Apology of the Augsburg Confession, Chapter III, para. 212)

“Then, again, [the word regeneratio, that is, ‘regeneration’] is sometimes used pro remissione peccatorum et adoptione in filios Dei, that is, so as to mean only the remission of sins, and that we are adopted as sons of God. And in this latter sense the word is much and often used in the Apology, where it is written: Iustificatio est regeneratio, that is, Justification BEFORE GOD is regeneration.” (Formula of Concord: Solid Declaration, Part III, para. 19)

Read more about Dr. Robert Barnes and justification by faith at this link.

Slugs at Midnight - A Garden Helper We Can Dig.

When this is a minor problem, few think about slugs,
but a wet season can really leverage slug populations and hunger.

Readers tell me that they see things for the first time after they read about it on the blog. They are not alone. I do some research for each post, so I keep learning more about gardening.

Once I identified "grassshopper damage" as slug damage, I did more research of slug abatement. Last year they were a minor annoyance but this year they are chewing on newly purchases plants.

I saw egg shells as a possible help - and they are free. I used them several days. Then I put clay shards around one plant. Pot shards are sharper and more permanent.

At Lowe's for another load of mulch - for the new rose garden - I bought a bag of diatomaceous earth. The microscopic creatures have a silica shell around them that remains after death. This was discovered in Germany about 1836.

Enormous piles of diatomaceous earth (DE) have been found in various places, which sounds a lot like deposits from the Genesis Flood. There are many uses for DE, including pest destruction, so DE is mined, used in food products, and even used as a health product when it is food grade.

God so designed many creatures so that any nick to their outside will kill them. Crawling insects and slugs share that vulnerability.

I powdered the welcome area in front of the back door
and no slugs came in last night.

Understanding Slugs
Slugs are creatures of rot, so they thrive with moisture. They also need darkness, so they  work at night. Our recent rains have multiplied our slug population. One website suggested visiting the garden in the dark, to see the slugs at work.

Everyone calm down. A massive slug attack in the dark will not reach its target's location until several days later.

I went outside late a night with a flashlight and the bag of diatomaceous earth. I was especially interested in the potatoes growing in the rotting straw bales - watered regularly. As Kenda says on his TV show, "Now they have my attention."

The straw bale and the wood mulch were populated with big, striped slugs, so I powdered them and the area with DE.

Rain or watering will eliminate the efficacy of DE. I am making clay pot shards for the important areas. The ceramic pieces will remain sharp and in place all summer.

DE does not attract slugs, so these creatures must come in contact to meet their doom.

Slugs seem to like beer and drown in it, but I doubt whether beer traps are feasible when slugs are a genuine problem.

Poisoned slug bait is counter-productive, because  those toxins also kill beneficial creatures.

Spinach and other leafy vegetables are tempting to slugs.
The spineless cowards, who only work at night, do not attack the stronger plants.

Toads love slugs.

Clay pots are handy as toad shelters and shards to stop slugs.

The re-taking of Toad Hall by Toad
and his allies.

Beyond the Duggar Headlines

The media will chew on the Megan Kelly interview of Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar. This never came up - three abusers were very close to the family:

1. Bill Gothard - They routinely attended training at the Gothard conferences. Josh and Anna Duggar met at one Gothard confab. Over 30 women reported being abused as youth by Bill Gothard, while Gothard's brother committed adultery with the women staffers.
2. Doug Phillips - This home-schooler's hero moved a young woman into his home to serve as a nanny and as his intimate, much like the Gothard approach. Like Gothard, he had to resign when the facts came out.
3. State Trooper Joseph Hutchens, a re-offender in state prison for the rest of his life, was a child pornographer.

This cluster of offenders around the family should tell us something about their toxic influence on the faith and actions of the Duggar clan. Gothard was a blatant false teacher among Evangelicals. Phillips was offended anyone brought up his disgusting behavior, because he was out of a job now. 

In Gothard’s booklet Establishing Biblical Standards of Courtship there is a page for sons and daughters to cut out which is a covenant they sign with their fathers to “…demonstrate your commitment to God’s plan for courtship instead of man’s philosophy of dating….”22 

The young person must say to his or her father, “I will wait for your full release before entering into marriage.” The father, in turn, tells his daughter that “I will protect you from unqualified men.” To his son the father says, “I will protect you from strange women.” This covenant is “between a father and a son as witnessed by the Lord Jesus Christ” and must be signed by the child, the father, and the family’s pastor.

Veinot, Don (2003-08-25). A Matter of Basic Principles (Kindle Locations 4219-4225). Midwest Christian Outreach, Inc. Kindle Edition. [GJ - Sound familiar, Duggar fans?]

Someone wrote me:

Your blog helps a lot, no question about it.  Just think about the people who have been abused in the church.  If even one finds your blog and is able to retain their faith because of the comfort they receive, isn't that fulfilling the will of God?

And whosoever shall give to drink unto one of these little ones a cup of cold [water] only in the name of a disciple, verily I say unto you, he shall in no wise lose his reward. Matt 10.42

I am only using the Duggar cluster of abusers to warn people away from similar situations in their own "conservative" Lutheran synods.

The Mother of the Year Award
came from an Evangelical leader who kept a hawt nanny in his home -
for his children, of course.
LCMS founder Martin Stephan did the same,
and left Dresden "In Pursuit of Religious Freedom."

Those who enable and empower these abusers are the worst criminals of all, yet they are at the top of the food pyramid, devouring the estates of widows and orphans, pointing their crooked fingers at anyone who questions their infallibility. I know another Josh who willfully erased the evidence of criminal behavior of synod leaders on the group blog he helps to edit - at the command and by the authority of Matt Harrison.

"Put not your faith in princes" - and that includes the princes of the visible church. 

Doug Phillips and Bill Gothard
must have shared tips on grooming young women for the harem.

Mulching the New Roses. Plus Soil Follies

The fungus has trapped the nematode, dissolving its body,
bartering its chemicals for some delicious carbon from the plant's roots.
Fungi need carbon to grow.

Mulching the new roses requires a large bag of newspapers and plenty of cyprus mulch.

The mulching began last year, with 10 bags of mushroom compost added around the maple tree's perimeter, cyprus mulch spread under the drip-line of the tree. The idea was to create enough soil to plant some shade-tolerant roses, since the tree was so poorly managed. Our helper and I pruned as many branches as we could at that time - safely. This spring our landscaper friend trimmed all the trees with great glee, using a powerful, small electric chain saw.

When we moved into this house, the maple tree was a disaster of suckers and untended bulb growth, plus weeds growing around the base. Cutting out the suckers growing up from the base helped. More trimming followed.

We now have a circle of new roses growing around the tree, drawing attention to more weeding and suckering that needs to be done. Mulching creates an attractive, woody look while feeding the roses year around. Earthworms like a damp, dark environment. When I dug in moist areas around the tree, the red wigglers were plentiful and active. They were almost absent where the soil was dried out.

Soil Follies
Many false ideas about gardening come from earlier ages. When woodland soil was broken up in colonial days, and animal manure added, production improved. That changed the soil from being woodland and fungi dominant to having more bacteria, which is good for vegetables. But the theory of the time was - plants eat soil.

Tull also actively encouraged farmers to loosen soil before planting crops; he had noticed that vegetables did better in loosened soil and from this concluded that plant roots possessed little mouths and ate soil particles (how else could a plant ingest nutrients?). Believing that loose soil consisted of smaller particles that would more easily fit into root mouths, he developed a horse-drawn hoe to put his theory into practice. His writings later caught the attention of gentlemen farmers like George Washington and Thomas Jefferson, who encouraged their fellow Americans to break up soils. The end result is that most home gardeners still break up and turn over their soil at least annually, even though we know plant roots don’t eat soil.

Lewis, Wayne;  Lowenfels, Jeff; (2010-09-10). Teaming with Microbes: The Organic Gardener's Guide to the Soil Food Web, Revised Edition (Kindle Locations 2803-2808). Timber Press. Kindle Edition. 

If plants eat soil, then it makes sense to turn it over and fluff it up, so the rototiller industry continues unabated. Leaves should be composted or mulch-mowed into the grass, not gathered up and hauled away. My neighbor at Almost Eden Nursery collects bags of autumn leaves to use as free food for his plants.

Fungi feed the plant roots directly in that delicate interface between soil and root hairs. Since one teaspoon of soil can have three miles of fungal tubes, breaking that up should be minimized. Soil should be left undisturbed, as much as possible.

Let me offer one anecdote from 2015. Our heavily mulched old rose garden had plenty of maple leaves stuck on top. Our helper said, "I will have to get out the blower and get rid of the leaves." I knew that would also blow the mulch around, so I suggested waiting. "Soon they will be gone."

Leaves do not leave this yard. I add leaves from other yards. Now all the leaves are gone from the rose garden, because the earthworms have pulled them down and digested them. The leaves, newspapers, and wood are all part of the food the roses get daily. No fertilizer is added, and the roses are spectacular.

Dandelions
My favorite herb likes to sit on top of the rose garden mulch and send its tap roots down below. They are mining calcium, which they can get deep down but not at the surface. Some call dandelions lawn nails. All plants like soluble calcium, but not all have such deep roots.

I bought a very large pair of scissors to trim the most aggressive dandelions and use their nutrition for the roses. I like cordless trimmers, but they nibble slowly, good for large swaths of trimming.

Lawn weeds can be influenced by the soil food web. Dandelions, for example, appear in calcium-poor soil surfaces. Their long taproots seek out the calcium they lack, and the calcium is deposited in the soil when the dandelion dies. In time— unfortunately, sometimes quite a long time— the soil food web biology works this calcium into the upper layer of soil, where it has been missing.

Lewis, Wayne;  Lowenfels, Jeff;   (2010-09-10). Teaming with Microbes: The Organic Gardener's Guide to the Soil Food Web, Revised Edition (Kindle Locations 2630-2633). Timber Press. Kindle Edition. 

Traditional theory holds that plants need the macro-ingredients (NPK) and also the micro-ingredients. That lends itself to soil mixing, but ignores the need for trapping nutrition where it is needed. The inorganic fertilizers pass through to the water table, providing only a little boost. Notice how often the great, wise gardening books say, "Add more fertilizer after blooming, or just before, and later too." Every gardening center will argue against manure because, you know, salts in it. And what are inorganic fertilizers? Nevermind.

The great and wise argue for fertilizer because most of it is wasted. The more one uses the chemicals, the more they wreck the soil food web. Lacking the natural controls, more chemicals are added to treat the problems cause by the previous wonder-chemicals.

Tuscan Sun rose - $5 each.

The soil creatures move nutrition around by devouring each other, and that traps these nutrients by holding them in their bodies, to be used when necessary by the fungi feeding the plant roots in exchange for carbon. Thus an active, healthy soil food web will maximize the number of soil creatures in the root zone - the top 12 inches - trapping useful, soluble chemicals and moisture.

Soil creatures do not feast and sink down into the water table, to pollute it with their dead bodies. Their deaths simply feed other creatures.

Bad Foundation
Most gardening is based on a poor foundation - evolution. Thinking about a Creation with a Purpose changes everything, especially Creation through the Word of God.

"Horrors!" - think the thought police. But early American and European scientists thought that way about everything around them. They were studying what God had done, not what chaos had developed by accident over billions of years.

When we look at every aspect of Creation having a purpose and many dependencies (bee, clover, nitrogen, soil creatures) - then all our practices change. They get easier and less expensive.

Every plant cell is a collection of chemical factories.

Roses Arrived and Now Circle the Maple Tree. Going Postal on the Slugs

Paradise rose.

The bargain roses for Father's Day came, ten in a surprisingly compact box. The box was quite warm, which may explain why roses are so beat up and dried out when they arrive.

They came via Gurney's from Weeks Roses, a wholesaler. This time I received two of each, one in each pair a very large and well developed plant. In the last shipment, all 10 were very large, more than any of the other companies'.

The first shipment has burst into so much color, so prolifically, that I decided to get more for Father's Day. Our initial agreement was just out the back door, where I had soft soil and mulch. But no, Chris had a better idea this morning.

"Why don't you put them around the maple tree out front?" I said with muted cheerfulness, "Sure." In movies, that is when the sound track starts sound like "wree, wree, wreee, wree" or someone begins chanting in Latin.

Bride's Dream rose.

I knew digging among maple tree roots would be a major challenge, especially since they had been dreadful close to the house.

Experts suggest avoiding maple trees, but there it is, pruned back by our landscaper friend, who loved creating a mountain of branches, logs, twigs, and leaves. The objection of "not enough sun" is met by the bottle brush look of the maple tree. Secondly, I planted as far away from the trunk as I could manage.

Tuscan Sun rose.

The first hole dug was fairly easy and the second one started well - "wree, wree, wree, wree." I hit a block of interconnected roots that were the size of a small loaf of bread. I shoveled, sawed, pried, hammered, and finally dislodged the entire lump.

Meanwhile, I was checking the labels on the roses as I fished them out of the rainwater barrel. They had a long soak and stayed there until the next two holes were dug each time.

I always wanted to grow Europeana, and now I had two of these floribundas to add color to the front yard. The other batch  is mostly floribunda, and I really like the sprays of flowers they produce. So does everyone else.

The others are just as promising, all hybrid teas. I used the shovel to measure distance and 10 fit around the tree just right. Mrs. Ichabod said, "I told you."

Europeana rose has been one of the top floribundas for years.

Hybrid teas are the favorites for vases, but floribundas make good bouquets, too.  So far the floribundas have not had the same staying power when cut. but there are plenty to harvest daily, and this is their first year.

Slugs - Use Egg Shells, Clay Shards, or Diotomaceous Earth

Slug control

Slugs are sensitive to having any kind of cut or abrasion. Some suggest egg shells as free treatment for slugs. I used some clay pot shards around one plant. But I saw more slug damage around younger plants, so I bought a bag of diatomaceous earth.

As the link suggests, watering early in the day is one control. This area is so soggy that we have a flood watch with no rain. The waterways are so full that we could still have flash flooding. Therefore, slugs are well watered and plenty hungry.

On the good side, observing the Eighth Commandment, slugs are mostly underground, where they are moving bags of water. They can cocoon themselves during a dry spell too, so they contribute to the overall moisture of the soil, but locking up water, just as mulch, earthworms, soil creatures do.

This Earned a "Can't Stop Laughing" Comment from an Alumnus - WELS Martin Luther College - Where Gay Is OK"Call Days Underline the Need for Recruitment"

 Hopeless drunk in college? -
expect a call in WELS.
Lead teachers in spiritual values.

CALL DAYS UNDERLINE THE NEED FOR RECRUITMENT

Call day at Martin Luther College, New Ulm, Minn., saw 86 candidates assigned to their field of ministry. All 2015 graduates available to go anywhere were assigned, but 40 requests for graduates were not able to be filled. A week later at Wisconsin Lutheran Seminary, Mequon, Wis., 32 graduates and about a dozen previous graduates received assignments, but approximately a dozen requests from congregations seeking a graduate were not able to be filled

It's all in fun, all in fun, all in fun,
until graduation day and the outing ceremony.

Michigan Lutheran Seminary is looking for a few good men,
to dress as women.

One Does Not Simply Harvest Asparagus. How To Attack a Shipment of Bare Root Roses

German Police Alerted to Armed Mob

BERLIN –  Police in rural northeastern Germany rushed out to track down a reported mob of up to 15 people armed with knives and sticks. Instead, they found a group of asparagus harvesters.

Police in the town of Ludwigslust said a man called their emergency number Saturday to report having seen "10 to 15 people armed with knives and sticks" on a local road.

Within minutes, six police cars were on their way to the scene. Officers quickly discovered, however, that the group was asparagus harvesters walking along the road with their work tools as they went to take a lunch break.

***

GJ - We have a beloved cousin living in Berlin, so my wife and I found the news story hilarious, especially since I. Grow. Asparagus.

In other news, the $5 bare root rose bushes arrived, my Father's Day gift from Mrs. I. The previous shipment from Gurney's has been so colorful and abundant that I had to take the second offer instead of Amazon's cordless drill and 87 drill bits.

The first priority was placement. I thought of a colorful row of roses in front of the wild area, but Mrs. I opted for roses close to the kitchen door. I will plant them at the end of the pumpkin patch, which is mulched and sunny. 

A sceptic wondered when I would run out of room for roses. I answered that I have the maple tree to circle with roses and a little room left in the corner of the main rose garden. I doubt whether any bare root roses are left for this year.

Steps in Creation Planting Roses:

• Placement - two factors really matter. One is sunlight. Morning sun is best, so the East is very good for roses. The second is viewing and access. The closer they are to viewing, the better. Just outside the backdoor works well for this group and they have some shade, so they will not cook on the hottest days. Water is easily available, too.
• Soaking - I have two barrels of rainwater for immersing them two hours or more. Judging by how hot the box was, the roses had a good sauna and could use the moisture before planting. The canes need it just as much as the roots. If rainwater is in short supply, stored water in a big barrel or garbage can is good. The chlorine evaporates out in a day or two.
• Digging the holes. If the area is tough to dig, soak it well the night before but not the day of. Digging in sloppy mud is not an experience to repeat. 
• I use a tripod box to measure how far apart I plant the roses. If they are parallel to a fence, I stretch out a line to keep the holes parallel. Otherwise a little bit of irregularity is not a problem as they grow. They are roses, not soldiers.
• If I dig into sod, I keep the lumps for upside-down placement in the hole. They decompose quickly and enrich the soil, packed with roots, worms, and soil microbes. A sod lump also stabilizes the new rose in its place.
• Rose roots can be pruned and often are. The real growth comes after planting. I prune broken ones and long ones that make planting awkward.
• Plant the rose on a pyramid of soil at the bottom of the opening. Pack it with some firmness, but not jumping up and down on the spot. Compacted soil is not good.
• After planting, two steps are important. Soak the soil into place, ideally with rainwater. Prune each cane to spur growth. I soaked the most dried out roses I have ever seen and pruned the dreadful looking canes - and they grew faster than all previous full-priced roses.
• Once planted - water roses daily for two weeks - especially the canes. Watering at the base is not enough at this stage. I often give the roses a shower and wash down the entire plant, long after planting. However, at this stage cane hydration is essential. 
• Mulching can be done or completed later. This is true rose feeding. The first layer is newspapers. I open a section of the newspaper and spread it out. If it is breezy, I soak them first. Wood mulch goes on top the newspapers to hold them down and complete the weed barrier, earthworm and fungus paradise.
• Look for the red-to-green leaves to pop out, some earlier, some later. Rainwater on lagging roses is a good idea. So is pruning another inch off the canes, especially canes that look woody, dead, or harmed at the tips. Water is never going to pass through dead areas so there can be no growth or flowers there until the pruning is done.
• Red wiggler earthworms will do the best in converting the mulch into rose food, tunneling, mixing, and fertilizing. 
  

Roses Do Not Need or Do Well With - 

1. Inorganic fertilizer. The chemical fertilizers drive away earthworms and harm the soil microbes that feed rose roots.
2. Pesticides. Spraying for pests will kill all the beneficial insects (ladybugs, flower flies, ichneumon wasps), harm the earthworms, and keep birds away - no food. Give the beneficials time and opportunity to eat their favorite foods.
3. Neglect. Roses are NOT a lot of work. They do require an appreciation of God's Creation and their needs. Continuous care means pruning - that is - cutting roses off for enjoyment, plus removing deadwood and blackspot. Watering may be necessary at times.

Rove beetles kill the bad guys, so do not kill them with pesticides.

The Jackson Rose Gardens
use Creation principles to have a constant display
of beautiful flowers with little expense and labor.

The Despised and Little Ones of the Garden

After I read several books that included the ichneumon wasp,
they began appearing before my eyes.

The despised and little ones of the garden get little attention, and when they do, it is often to get rid of them. Last night I let Sassy outside, since we cannot have a doggy door. I noticed our nightly slug had crawled under the kitchen door  and was slowly moving inland, at breakneck speed.

We get one a night, unless it is raining hard. Then several will show up. One was so large and fat that I thought the gasket on the door was loose.

When I woke up later and turned on the lights, that same slug did a quick u-turn and began working its way back to the door.

People often rant about how much they hate slugs. A criticism against Ruth Stout's mulch gardening efforts was - "She had a lot of slugs." True, when one begins to compost and mulch, the slug population increases along with all the other soil and decomposition creatures.

Those who believe in Creation might consider God's purpose. We now realize that the lowly maggot is an excellent medical tool for treating infections, since it eats the diseased flesh and excretes an antibiotic, far better but less attractive than pills.

I thought Rodale, the Jerusalem and Mecca of organic gardening, would have some kind words about slugs, but this article dismisses slugs as annoying pests.

For every slug you see above ground, three or four are underground, foraging in the soil. Both snails and slugs possess a radula, a series of chitinous teeth not unlike a wood rasp, which allows these garden gastropods to grind their food down to very tiny particles. Many slugs and snails are capable of digesting cellulose. 

Snails and slugs have a place in the soil food web. They speed decomposition and decay by shredding their food before they consume it. Like earthworms and some of the arthropods, they open up organic matter so that fungi and bacteria can get at it. Their underground travels create pathways for air, water, and roots; the slime they produce helps bind soil. They themselves are a food source for ground and rove beetles (particularly in their larval stages), spiders, garden snakes, salamanders, lizards, and birds. Some nematodes that subsist on slugs are now available commercially; these blind worms “heat-sink” in on a hapless slug, parts of which become a meal for the successful nematode while the remainder is left to bacterial and fungal colonization and decay. 

When gastropods are part of a healthy food web, their numbers are controlled; they do not become the serious pests they can be in a garden where the use of chemicals and other damaging practices has thrown the system out of balance.

Lewis, Wayne; Lowenfels, Jeff; (2010-09-10). Teaming with Microbes: The Organic Gardener's Guide to the Soil Food Web, Revised Edition (Kindle Locations 1484-1491). Timber Press. Kindle Edition. 

Feeling sluggish? These spineless creatures
do their work in great numbers but never at high speed.

Slugs have rasping mouths, even though everything else seems to be mucous or slime, making them very vulnerable and a favorite food for ducks, garter snakes, toads, and starlings. On the negative side, they chew on living plants, leaving holes in the leaves, and prey upon those new tender shoots, like the plants just bought at the nursery - tiny leaves on tiny plants in tiny cardboard pots.

I find this kind of damage on a limited number
of young plants, sunflower seedlings and new vines.

Slugs are mostly underground and quite numerous, so battling to eliminate them is rather futile. As mentioned many times before, hosting pest eaters is a great way to have pest control for free.

I will concede that first-aid may be needed for new plants struggling to grow beyond the first few leaves. I would use diatomaceous earth as my first choice. Egg shells, beer traps, and some other green controls are in this linked article. 

Here our secondary consumer is the ground beetle that captures and consumes the immature slug.


Walliser, Jessica (2014-02-26). Attracting Beneficial Bugs to Your Garden: A Natural Approach to Pest Control (Kindle Locations 243-244). Timber Press. Kindle Edition. 

Firefly larvae live under or on the ground and are generalist predators, consuming the likes of slugs, snails, worms, and various insect larvae. Their plated, armorlike exterior affords protection from other predators.


Walliser, Jessica (2014-02-26). Attracting Beneficial Bugs to Your Garden: A Natural Approach to Pest Control (Kindle Locations 915-917). Timber Press. Kindle Edition. 

Rove beetles are distinguished by their short wing covers and exposed, segmented abdomen. Adult beetles like the one shown here consume the same prey as their fast-moving larvae—termites, slugs, snails, root maggots, and various other insects.


Walliser, Jessica (2014-02-26). Attracting Beneficial Bugs to Your Garden: A Natural Approach to Pest Control (Kindle Locations 1033-1034). Timber Press. Kindle Edition. 

Earthworms will also travel inside, sometimes in a great migration of 20-25 in the kitchen. They are not regulars but they seem to come inside as part of a group. Peer pressure? 

Creation gardeners do their best to increase the earthworm population. Red wigglers are ideal, but they need food to do their work. Dropping them onto un-nourished soil will limit what they do best. But using them with compost and mulch will multiply their numbers beyond belief. They are not only the ultimate mixers and tunneling agents, they also multiply and make useful the chemicals needed by plants. I dropped 4,000 earthworms around the growing areas, on the compost, and around the perimeter of the yard. I have not dug anywhere this year without plenty of red wigglers already on duty.

Plants create their own mulch all the time, shedding leaves and organic matter, roots growing and rotting, so earthworms are a natural in the lawn. One section of the main rose garden has a colony of white clover growing unhindered. Some would get rid of it, but I see it as a McDonald's for bees and a nitrogen fixer for the roses.

I did not notice flower flies in the garden
until I read about them in Sharon Lovejoy's book, A Blessing of Toads.
They are not tiny bees but insects whose babies eat pests like aphids.
I see them all the time now.

If bees like a plant, other nectar and pollen creatures will also depend on it. We do not need a degree in science to know about all of them, but it is good to look for them and increase the support for them. 

To paraphrase Luther, God delights to use the despised and little ones in the garden to do His best work. A teaspoon of soil contains up to three miles of fungal tubes, which are essential in feeding and protecting plants. They even trap and kill destructive nematodes, delivering the nematode innards to the hungry plant.

The great and wise ones in the visible church are really parasites. They live off the labor of the very congregations and pastors they despise, but the little ones are doing the Gospel ministry while brief and meaningless honors go to their oppressors.

The conservative Lutheran leaders eat this up
and close traditional, liturgical congregations.
A corrupt tree (unfaith) can only bear evil fruit.

Don't ask WELS consultants what they charge.
You will have a heart attack.